The Hiring Methods of Hubspot

It’s simple to test potential employees for their expertise, such as editing or coding skills. However, it’s considerably harder to gauge whether a prospective employee will be an appropriate fit for a business. Fro this reason, the Hubspot website design company has spent years developing effective interview methods that help to hire the best employment candidates.

When David Cancel provides interviews for potential job candidates for engineering at HubSpot, he gives potential hires a disposable cup of water while conducting the interview. When the interview ends, Mr. Cancel leaves the disposable cup on a table. He waits to observe whether the potential hire throws the disposable cup away. If the candidate fails to do so, they are likely an inappropriate candidate for employment with Hubspot.

If the potential hire being interviewed does not discard the cup, it shows that this potential hire is probably not well suited to working with a team. Cancel is adamant that this strategy works, because it assists with gauging a potential employee’s functional behavior. He has employed this tactic over than 100 times, and he claims it’s been an excellent tactic that hasn’t yet failed him. The potential hires that failed to discard the cup all ended up not being a good cultural fit for the company.

Cancel used to rely on traditional interviewing methods. He used to ask about a candidate’s background and he’d ask them to complete skill games. He doesn’t believe this was an interviewing strategy that works. He realized that after years of creating teams, this strategy failed to develop the best teams. Further, he states that, though he hired excellent people, the teams didn’t interact well with one another. He then decided to employ interview methods, and found that these more qualitative strategies worked much better.

he strives to employ people that exhibit what he dubs, “HEART”, an acronym that means: humble, effective, adaptable, remarkable, and transparent. He believes these qualities cannot be quantified effectively by using a questionnaire or through usual quantitative methods. Cancel commences by trying to engage candidates in a discussion about any subject, which he believes serves as a task, since part of his job is to employ typical engineers, who tend to be introverted people. When a subject catches the candidate’s attention, he observes their facial expressions and the appearance of their eyes.

He then shifts the conversation segues to topics related to work. As he does this, he observes the candidate’s passions with regard to subjects brought up during this discussion. Not only is he attempting to observe which subjects ignite the potential hire’s passions, but he has a chance to observe the manner with which they interact with him, and the method they employ to communicate. If the potential hire exhibits a notable interest in a subject that is related to HubSpot, the prospective employee will very likely be an appropriate fit for the company.

Tom Cattaneo, a manger at Hubspot, employs a tactic that is quite simple. He leaves his office door cracked open a little bit, so he can observe whether an interview candidate approaches or walks into the office on their own volition, or if they wait to be called. He utilizes this method, because it shows which potential employees are assertive by walking into his office.

Michael Redbord, Hubspot’s director of customer support, lets his prospective employees ask questions during his interviews. His task is to hire employees who are employed to solve customer issues, so candidates who are most concerned with questions regarding their salary or advancement opportunities won’t gain employment with Hubspot in this capacity.

Since Cancel has shared his unique tactics with other company members who conduct interviews, HubSpot’s Employee Net Promoter Score, a quantitative measure of engagement among employees, was raised from a low or average score to a high score. The company also exhibits an 85 percent retention rate of their employees. Considering that their competition lies among companies, such as Facebook and Google, this is pretty amazing.